ENB and Weather Mods

[Garfink]

I noticed that there are many ENBs that are based solely on ELFX and are not compatible with Climates of Tamriel.  Which makes sense because COT messes with color and if the ENB isn't designed with COT in mind you are going to have unpredictable colors in certain weather conditions.

 

With that in mind, I was wondering about weather mods like enhanced dynamic weather system, do all weather mods mess with color or can I use enhanced dynamic weather system (or other such vanilla weather mods) safely with any ENBs? Any general recommendation for weather with ENBs that don't like COT?

 

(It's just that my favorite ENBs just don't support COT or even the enb-weather mod and I really miss the many different weather patterns you get with COT and its adjutant mods.  The first time I got caught in a Supreme Storm blizzard was simply awesome!)

 

(partly answered my own question... just noticed that supreme storm is compatible with vanilla weather!)

[prod80]

Try without the SkyFix :P just saying when you balance with that off you get a LOT better results with CoT.. try the ENB from my page and have a look between Clear/Overcast and Cloudy CoT weathers. With Skyfix it requires so odd settings on the Skies and there will always be weathers that just look like junk or where mountains just blend horribly with the horizon because for whatever reason the horizon got really dark (which you cannot change because you'll mess up clear type weathers, blowing out the entire horizon to pure white)

[Mangaclub]

yea the gradients are a bit tricky. Thats why i made now over 89 different weather settings with Vividian ENB that covers up this gradient mess. Was absolutley worth it!

[Aiyen]

Already have made a patch that alters every single weather that your patches does not touch! ;)

Also fixes the odd number of issues with several weathers that just have wrong color values... cases where his copy paste have gone a bit too fast. Also fixed many cases of wrong cloud layer values etc. There is an entire range of weathers that have the golden horizon clouds you only see during dusk, stuck during the entire day... there is also a weather where the middle component is just pure black... no amount of ENB stuff is going to help with that.

 

Also disabling it or not does not change the fact that the main difference between cloudy and clear weathers are that the cloudy weathers have a much darker base blue color then clear weathers.

As I recall the then clear has 150ish in the blue RGB component, and the cloudy/overcast have 100.

 

That sort of color difference is always going to be really noticeable.

[prod80]

Well all I can say is that you can setup an ENB not to care about the blue-ness of the Sky...

 

Here example (the ENB is setup pretty bright, so yes, it's bright):

 

CoT without ENB, Cloudy weather type ~10:00 AM

 

ENB Enabled:

 

Clear Weather:

[Aiyen]

Ah yeah.. red/purpleish sky... how I do not miss you! I only maintained it in about 5-10 weathers out of the 500 or so... then its fine. 

 

This is my color. 

 

 

 

I believe the weather is xxx58148 

The most clear and bright weather type that CoT has. If I just use the default colors there, and the same settings it would be more or less white from horizon to the very top. 

[prod80]

Its because I sepia toned the image... Just because you said red/purple-ish I went to check the RGB, but there is no red or purple-ish at all, but they are not truly blue either. Rather a sort of pale blue where RG are ~equal and B is about 10-20% higher. The blue in your image is more Sky blue than what CoT spits out by default, my skies are more pale than CoT's default, the Sepia is responsible, but I don't want to disable it as I like the effect :P

 

Same spot between the ENB/Non ENB shots... RGB value on ENB is 196/204/225 while CoT default has 125/141/164

 

Here shot of the same weather btw, and yes 58148 is the brightest Clear SN type weather CoT has (I use it to balance snow brightness - ie. Direct Light and Ambient Light Intensity max values for exterior)

 

 

 

PS would love to give your plugin a go, see what it does ;) I'm all for improvements

[phazer11]

Is the image not resizing for anyone? It's a little bit obnoxious.

[Aiyen]

You need to resize it before uploading it. I downscale all my images from 1440p to 720p before I upload them to imgur.

But yeah at least make it a linked image I think is best for this forum.

 

And sure I always need more beta testers! Will handle it in pms instead of here though.

[phryxolydian]

I use ENBoost alone and since I started using it I've noticed nights to be quite a lot brighter when using CoT. I use to have the Darker Nights 3 version but now I think I can even see more than in vanilla, I'm going to have to use the 7 or 8 version I think..

[diannetea]

Okay, I know I'm necroing this thread a little bit, but the lighting combination I have just come up with is the best thing ever. Seriously, I have 120 screenshots with multiple lighting setups and ENB combinations, it took HOURS.

 

 

 

The combination goes like this.

 

Climates of Tamriel

COT Nights Level 4 (adjust as you prefer, obviously)

Dawnguard + Dragonborn patches (if you need them)

COT Interiors Warm

ELFX

ELFX Dawnguard + Dragonborn (again if necessary)

Lanterns of Skyrim

LOS Dawnguard Patch

ELE - Interior Lighting

Vividian ENB

 

Besides the former I did not use anything except the Hires Texture Packs (didn't feel like installing STEP just to test this), RaceMenu, SkyUI, iHUD, and Alternate Start

 

The load order is sorted with BOSS, but here it is anyway:

 

ClimatesOfTamriel.esm

Lanterns Of Skyrim - All In One - Main.esm

Lanterns Of Skyrim - AIO - Dawnguard.esp

RaceMenu.esp

SkyUI.esp

iHUD.esp

EnhancedLightsandFX.esp

ELFX - Dawnguard.esp

ELFX - Dragonborn.esp

ELE-Interior Lighting.esp

ELE DG-Interior Lighting.esp

ELE HF-Interior Lighting.esp

ELE DB-Interior Lighting.esp

ClimatesOfTamriel-Dawnguard-Patch.esp

ClimatesOfTamriel-Dragonborn-Patch.esp

ClimatesOfTamriel-Interiors-Warm.esp

ClimatesOfTamriel-Nights-Level-4.esp

Alternate Start - Live Another Life.esp

 

 

The lighting combinations I tested were

---

Vanilla

Vanilla and RealVision

Vanilla and Vividian

Vanilla and Skylight

---

COT, ELFX, LOS (COT handling all interior lighting)

COT, ELFX, LOS, RealVision - Caves were ridiculously bright, no idea why

COT, ELFX, LOS, Vividian

COT, ELFX, LOS, Skylight - This had a HUGE issue, the interiors were all black with no lights

---

COT, ELFX (COT only for weather, ELFX handling all lighting, this was the worst outside at night)

COT, ELFX, RealVision

COT, ELFX, Vividian

COT, ELFX, Skylight

---

COT, ELFX, LOS, ELE (All COT except Dungeons, ELFX + patches only)

COT, ELFX, LOS, ELE, RealVision

COT, ELFX, LOS, ELE, Vividian

COT, ELFX, LOS, ELE, Skylight - Instant CTD when loading the save with this setup, no screenshots

 

Here is a link if anyone wants to download the screenshots. The ones just numbered are vanilla.  RV = RealVision, V = Vividian, S = Skylight

 

The game is sort of ugly, because again I did not install any other mods. Be forewarned, t's a big download (almost 300mb) because I did not resize any of the images.

 

https://diannetea.com/Lighting%20Comparisons.rar

 

And the clean saves (I'm hoping I did this right, I've never shared save files) in case anyone wants to try them out in the same locations:

 

https://diannetea.com/Saves.rar

 

I used the console command "set gamehour to" and used 10 and 24 for testing in each spot.  The caves were tricky because that character is a noob with no armor and a bear beat me up on the way in, so I was using tm to hide the UI as well.

 

 

[Mangaclub]

Woah awsome! just downloading the Comparission! Will look at it asap. Nice to see Vividian ENB worked so well for you :)

please feel free to post some pictures as Userpictures there!

[Aiyen]

Okay I have to ask... what is LOS ? I cannot recall that atm. :(

 

Would be very interested in knowing what it is and why it has issues with my ENB.

Would probably help explain why some people report weird CTD´s etc when using it as well, Thanks! :)

 

 

Also you should try to use the CoT Weather patch... Original CoT has so many issues and bugs, and ENB only make them more apparent.

[deathneko11]

I think it's Lantern's of Skyrim. I cannot imagine how it would cause issues though, it's always worked beautifully for me.

[Aiyen]

Ah yeah okay that makes sense. But hmmm that mod works flawlessly on my end. Never had issues with that.

 

So sadly that does not bring me any closer to figuring out why it would cause any CTD. There is nothing in my preset that is radically different from any other preset that can use the latest binary version. Only odd reason I can think of is that since I do not include an enblocal.ini then you get a CTD due to the default values not working for ya. I know many of the others do include one, but they then have loads of people who also have issues since it is not properly setup.

 

About the black interiors, then the last person who had that, had his load order wrong, and hence did not have the ELE settings enabled inside the interiors. This was a BOSS load order issue that should have been fixed though. But my guess is that it is the reason for this as well. Specifically alternate start would be my first guess... that mod alters so many cells, that it would conflict with any lighting mod.

[diannetea]

Ah yeah okay that makes sense. But hmmm that mod works flawlessly on my end. Never had issues with that.

 

So sadly that does not bring me any closer to figuring out why it would cause any CTD. There is nothing in my preset that is radically different from any other preset that can use the latest binary version. Only odd reason I can think of is that since I do not include an enblocal.ini then you get a CTD due to the default values not working for ya. I know many of the others do include one, but they then have loads of people who also have issues since it is not properly setup.

 

About the black interiors, then the last person who had that, had his load order wrong, and hence did not have the ELE settings enabled inside the interiors. This was a BOSS load order issue that should have been fixed though. But my guess is that it is the reason for this as well. Specifically alternate start would be my first guess... that mod alters so many cells, that it would conflict with any lighting mod.

Oh, duh, yes Lanterns of Skyrim!

 

I think it's that specific combination of mods causing the problem.  I tried twice to load with it and it just wouldn't, and considering it was a clean save and only a handful of mods there, and it loaded every other time, there has to be something there that's creating issues.  I also am definitely going to install the weather patch, I just didn't think it would be necessary for screen grabs.  If you are not having issues, I wonder if it's because the weather patch has fixed something?  I also did not have any of the Unofficial Patches installed.  I'm currently fumbling through the CK to attempt to make a real food patch for Requiem and RND (I got at least one food working to satisfy needs with Requiem's balance, yay!) or else I'd try some more.  I'm also just really, really good at breaking anything software related.  Like, I look at a computer and the OS melts.

 

If I remember and my brain isn't completely fried (or my arms haven't fallen off) by the time I'm done with this, I'll go poke at it a few more times to see if I can figure it out.